Sensation as if

According to - DR. Herbert A. Roberts M.D.

Kirti Longani

SENSATION As If - is a subjective symptom and it has got immense importance in our Homeopathy. According to Dr. H. A. Roberts, "In fact, not only was psora considered the mother of all diseases, but it might well have been considered as the source of all subjective symptoms, especially those described by the patients 'sensation as if ----'. In classifying those constitutional diseases which have not run a course through so many centuries, that is, the venereal classifications, it has been noted that their action has been swifter; and while at times more destructive, the subjective symptoms have been present in the degree in which psora has been present in the system".

Psora mainly creates disturbance in the sensations and functions. Due to its hypersensitivity & hyper-reactivity nature, Psora is also called "the Sensitizing Miasm". Master Hahnemann says in his Organon of Medicine in § 80, ' ----- the psora, the only real fundamental cause and producer of all the others numerous, I may say innumerable, forms of disease, which, under the names of nervous debility, hysteria, hypochondriasis, mania, melancholia, imbecility, madness, epilepsy and convulsions of all sorts, ---- defects of the senses and pains of thousand kinds, &c., figure in systematic works on pathology as peculiar, independent diseases ". According to Dr. J. N. Kanjilal, "The mind is hypersensitive and hyperactive to slightest stimuli, both endogenous and exogenous, but produces nothing. Full of ideas but no tendency to materialize any of them. A psoric subject may be called 'A STERILE PHILOSOPHER'. According to Dr. Harimohan Choudhury, "Psoric patients have weakness of memory; but full of imaginations, emotions and sensations --- without any object basis".

So, from the Homeopathic view-point - both in respect of mental sphere and miasmatic angle, 'sensations as if ----' has got a prime importance on prescribing.

The highest and most important level through which the human being functions is Mental and Spiritual level. Generally we can say, "The mental plane of an individual is that which registers changes in understanding and consciousness". It is the most crucial level. It is on the mental level that an individual thinks, criticizes, compares, calculates, communicates, etc. Disturbance of these functions in turn constitute SUBJECTIVE SENSATIONS.

SENSATIONS are of three kinds

ORGANIC SENSATION - Some of them are not localized. They are vital feeling; e.g. Sensation of comfort or discomfort. They are produced by general condition of the organism as a whole. Some of them are vaguely localized; e.g. Headache, Hunger, Thirst, etc. The Organic Sensations have following characters

- They have NO special sense organ.

- They are produced by external stimuli.

- They are produced by changes in the internal organs.